The Epidemiology and Genetics (E&G) Core provides a central focus to translate the findings from clinical and cellular studies to applications in ongoing epidemiologic studies. The Core fosters new epidemiologic initiatives that draw on the clinical and biologic developments from other components of the BNORC. Further, the Core provides a center for training and development of expertise among statisticians who provide consultation to other studies within the BNORC. In contrast with other cores, the E&G Core provides most of its services through consultation and analysis of data sets. It provides consultation on study design, on the analytic approaches to data from clinical trials and epidemiologic and genetic studies, and the presentation of results. To provide these services, the core conducts a regular working group in obesity research where data plans, preliminary analyses, and research results are presented. Core faculty also meets one-on-one with researchers. Programming support is also provided to studies lacking the necessary expertise. In the last competing renewal, we expanded the core services to include genetic epidemiology and statistical analysis of obesity and related phenotypes. These services have contributed to the discovery of genetic variants for the common form of obesity through genome-wide association studies (GWAS). To date, more than 50 genetic loci have been convincingly associated with obesity. These discoveries have substantially enhanced our understanding of the pathophysiology of energy balance and obesity and have provided potential new targets for obesity prevention and treatment. However, these loci confer only a modest effect size and do not add to the clinical prediction of obesity. There is increasing evidence that epigenetic regulation of gene expression may contribute to an individual's predisposition to obesity and its related chronic diseases and may also explain part of the 'missing heritability'. In particular, fetal